‘Stick guns’ among 300 rare weapons on display at BSF’s Arms Museum in Indore

PTI, May 18, 2024, 2:27 PM IST

Indore: Have you seen a gun that looks like a stick from the outside but is capable of killing someone when its trigger is pulled and the bullet hits the target?

At least three such ‘stick guns’ are on display at the Arms Museum of the Central School of Armament and Warfare Skills (CSWT) of the Border Security Force (BSF) in Madhya Pradesh’s Indore.

Set up in 1967 based on the vision of BSF Director General K F Rustomjee, the museum is home to 300 rare weapons, officials said on Friday on the eve of International Museum Day, observed on May 18.

The museum’s collection, sourced from different places, includes big weapons such as rocket launchers and machine guns of various sizes to mini pistols that can fit into one’s palm, they said.

Talking to PTI, CSWT Inspector General BS Rawat said the museum displays weapons from the 14th century to the later periods.

“The museum gives you a glimpse of weapons used by man since the beginning and how they gradually evolved by the first and second World Wars,” he said.

Rawat said the facility had also housed the pistol that freedom fighter Bhagat Singh used to kill British officer J P Saunders on December 17, 1928, in Lahore.

The semi-automatic pistol, developed by US-based weapons manufacturer Colts, was sent to Punjab in 2017 following the directions of the Union Home Ministry and is currently on display at a museum at Hussainiwala in Ferozepur district.

A portrait of this pistol is at the arms museum in honour of the martyred freedom fighter, he said.

The senior officer further said personnel who train at CSWT are introduced to these weapons to learn the shortcomings of the indigenous and foreign weapons of various periods.